Keysweeper – Microsoft Wireless Keyboard Sniffing

Keysweeper is a project, standing on the shoulders of other work, to create what appears to be a USB wall charger, but is actually logging keystrokes from nearby Microsoft wireless keyboards.

Sniffing wireless keyboards has been around for a long time. I wrote about it in part of a blog entry in 2008. Taking a quick glance, at the articles, it sounds like Microsoft is still using XOR to provide confidentiality in wireless keyboards. Makes me happy I’m using Logitech’s wireless keyboard. Logitech says they provide 128-bit AES encryption. The product info at Amazon for Microsoft’s keyboard merely states it has “secured wireless transmission”. Or apparently not.